It'll be next on my list. In the end I abandoned Fallout New Vegas. Great game, but I decided to take a break. Something new appeals. And hey, Elex sounds like a cross between Oblivion and Fallout, so what's not to like?

The game is downloading...and downloading...and downloading...I set it to download last night and much to my chagrin it was still only at 29% this morning because my lazy computer decided to have a long nap.

But now I know how to tell my computer NOT to sleep when I'm downloading a large file.

Okay. First impressions; it's Gothic, more or less. Same tough guy hero -- and I take issue with that. Surely by now we could have a badass woman hero! I mean, seriously. What that says about the game`s developers. You`d think they`re just a bunch of guys that never met a woman other than their mothers. This is the 21st century. We got women doing all kinds of stuff now. Not just kitchen and babies! We too can be heroes! Lots of games have female protagonists! Really, they do. Get out more, you guys! There`s more to life than programming and pizza. Get out of the basement and check it out someday.

Anyway, rant aside, the game has the same controls as Gothic. I was just able to jump in and start playing. The menus are a bit more complicated, and there is one combat move that has me stumped because I have no idea what to do (it's very cool anyway), but basically it's the same deal. You're alone and helpless. Find a faction to join -- combat, mage, or what have you. Gather stuff. Level up. The presence of collectible plants clearly means alchemy in one form or another. It looks as though the levelling options are pretty cool, varied and branching, though it`s a bit early to tell. The acting is as bad as Gothic, which is to say a bunch of guys (again with the guys) delivering tough guy lines in tough-guy-ese.

I`ll keep going for a while and let you know how it goes, but so far, I like it.

My first impressions tell me that if you like Gothic and Risen, you'll like this. Even the music is Gothic-like.

The plot is as follows: a comet hit the planet. Chaos ensued. Civilization collapsed. Elex, which is what the comet was made of, has polluted the planet. Many years later, some use elex for magic, some use it for technology. So far I've met an ally who gets me to the first community, where I meet some other people, get a few quests, and learn more about the other factions. This faction is magic-using and anti-technology. One of the other factions is technology-oriented, addicted to elex (a drug?) and robotic as a result, and the third one is clerics. There's another faction I can't get a handle on yet, but it's early days. And they all want world-domination, natch, because what else?

The graphics are pretty, and on my laptop the game is smooth as silk.

I'm going back to my Oblivion game for a while, but I'll be back to this shortly. I need to figure out that cool (but flummoxing) combat move before I move on in Elex.

Okay. First impressions; it's Gothic, more or less. Same tough guy hero -- and I take issue with that. Surely by now we could have a badass woman hero! I mean, seriously. What that says about the game`s developers. You`d think they`re just a bunch of guys that never met a woman other than their mothers. This is the 21st century. We got women doing all kinds of stuff now. Not just kitchen and babies! We too can be heroes! Lots of games have female protagonists! Really, they do. Get out more, you guys! There`s more to life than programming and pizza. Get out of the basement and check it out someday.

Agreed, they should have a female protagonist available by now. Preferably in heels, carrying pizzas that shoot nachos.

It's Gothic, but with way cooler stuff, like a jet pack, and a much more interesting game world. So far, it's great. I'm working on quests for one faction, but I haven't decided where I'll end up -- sort of like in Gothic, the first place you land gives you some easy quests and some idea about what the other factions are like.